I don't know if this has anything to do with the APCO-25 system testing mentioned on previous threads but yesterday "York, County of" in the FCC database was issued 26 separate licenses. Some are designated YW and some as PW, in the 500-503 (of those I checked) Mhz range.

OK who is right and who is wrong about decoding pocsag pages? One person says its not illegal and the other says it is illegal, but he does it. I have been looking at software and hardware packages from various vendors, but I figured it easier(and cheaper), if someone had them available. I have had some volunteers who run for a couple of different stations ask me about this. They were considering buying their own pagers so they could have them programmed for each respective station so I told them I would try to gather some info for them. I don't want to stir anyone up!

Okay since these new radios will be used personally by me in the future I have a few questions... I do realize that there may be some unknown answers.

1.) How many potential trunking channels can be used at one given time? Meaning if one police officer from each zone, one firefighter, and one emt all keyed up at the same time on their own talk groups could the system handle all of these transmissions at one time?

2.) Is there an update on when they will put the radio system to use?

3.) Is there anywhere online I can monitor the live feed during testing throughout the week (on the new system)?

4.) On the York county website there are three tan portable radios and three black radios...Does anyone know what model will be issued to police, fire and ems?

5.) Have any of the radios been installed in York County Control as of this date?

6.) How will the radios be compatible with other agencies? Do you need to call county with a set of codes or frequencies of the agency you want to speak with or can they just patch you through?? How does this work?? Example: Say I am dispatched to an area outside of Pennsylvania, say into Maryland....can I just turn the knob to that pre-programed frequency and talk to them or do I need to call York County and say I would like to talk to Westminster Fire Department ?

Again, I realize that there may not be answers for everything I listed above as of yet.. Just curious how a system works !! Thanks

I don't know if this has anything to do with the APCO-25 system testing mentioned on previous threads but yesterday "York, County of" in the FCC database was issued 26 separate licenses. Some are designated YW and some as PW, in the 500-503 (of those I checked) Mhz range.

Plenty of strong signals.

Hope the systems are in the clear.

Best,

Andy
Scannist
DelCo

York is adding additional Freq. Pairs for the Off Trunking - Conventional Tactical / Fireground Setup. They already have some, but need more. This will allow the radios to go off the trunk system for PD tactical or Fire FG operations in areas that it would not be safe to use the Trunking system's TAC or FG talkgroups. They will also be used for Patches into the Trunked System's Various TG's.

Okay since these new radios will be used personally by me in the future I have a few questions... I do realize that there may be some unknown answers.

1.) How many potential trunking channels can be used at one given time? Meaning if one police officer from each zone, one firefighter, and one emt all keyed up at the same time on their own talk groups could the system handle all of these transmissions at one time?

The county-wide network is broken down into five systems; a central system, south system, west system, north system, and the fulton tower (it's own system). The central system has 14 channels, one is the control channel, so essentially, the central system can handle 13 voice calls simultaneously. The south, west, and north systems each have ten channels, one being a control channel, so each system can handle 9 voice calls. The fulton system is a "filler" system for the tough coverage areas along the Susquehanna River near Peach Bottom. It has three channels, so two voice calls can occur simultaneously.

To make a long story short, the new system can handle many more voice calls at once than the systems currently in place in York County.

Quote:

2.) Is there an update on when they will put the radio system to use?

System acceptance is anticipated in early summer (full foliage on trees allows more thorough system testing) and user loading will begin shortly after that. All county users will be loaded by the end of the year, but likely much sooner.

Quote:

3.) Is there anywhere online I can monitor the live feed during testing throughout the week (on the new system)?

This site has popped very recently and seems to have a feed of the testing of the new system. Please keep in mind that the system is not optimized, so if some of the audio sounds rough, well, it's still a work in progress.

Quote:

4.) On the York county website there are three tan portable radios and three black radios...Does anyone know what model will be issued to police, fire and ems?

Most users will receive the tan looking radios (they are in fact more gray then tan in person) with the display and limited key pad. Users requiring high-tier functions (mainly encryption) such as sensitive police units and the QRT will get the black radios.

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5.) Have any of the radios been installed in York County Control as of this date?

Yes. I believe there are control stations. I'm not sure if they are wired into the console system, or being used as desktop units.

Quote:

6.) How will the radios be compatible with other agencies? Do you need to call county with a set of codes or frequencies of the agency you want to speak with or can they just patch you through?? How does this work?? Example: Say I am dispatched to an area outside of Pennsylvania, say into Maryland....can I just turn the knob to that pre-programed frequency and talk to them or do I need to call York County and say I would like to talk to Westminster Fire Department ?

Currently, there are no counties bordering York County who have systems on which our new portables can operate directly, with the exception of conventional UHF med channels (Dauphin, Cumberland, Adams) and Dauphin's UHF police channels. Dauphin County is building a UHF P25 system similar to York's, which will allow direct operation of York's radios on their new system (not to say that that's how it'll work, but is could). From what I understand, interoperability with other counties who have proprietary systems will be done through patches and gateway connections, depending on how each county's system will allow. This may be accomplished through VOIP, microwave, or radio links. These are connections directly to the other countys' systems. Since voice within our system is carried in an IP format, it is very flexible, and can be carried in many different ways. Some of these 'patches' may be in place full-time, and some may need to be established as needed. But rest assured, M/A-Com's system does allow for very versatile interoperability options.

I hope I answered your questions thoroughly and in a way everyone can understand. Nick and Dave, if you have any corrections, additions, or clarifications, don't hesitate!

__________________
Matt
"If the tallest building in your county is a grain silo, you DON'T need 800mhz!"

OCGUARD;
You are incorrect. It is not illegal to receive POCSAG messages as long as as you can decode them over the air. If it is encrypted it is illegal. If you can hear it you can decode!!!

Here I go again with your nonsense. You give me a headache. Your statement "If you can hear it you can decode" is absolutely ridiculous. Early cellular phone systems could be "decoded" my many scanners on the market, as could many portable phones. It is still illegal to intercept these transmissions. Even current cell phones aren't encrypted - they just operate in formats, such as TDMA, that aren't monitor-able my consumer scanners. This makes it no less legal to intercept these communications. These are telecommunications systems used by the public as an extension of the public telephone system. To intercept these calls is not only a violation of FEDERAL telecommunications laws but likely falls under federal, state, and local eavesdropping laws as well. You bring out the worst side of me on the board! Stick with GMRS.

As for Lebanon's websites with their POCSAG message strings, well, I don't have the answer to that. Perhaps it's being done illegally, or maybe it's kosher because it's sponsored by the county. As Peter said, if the information is tapped from a hard-wired component of the system, and with the system owner's blessing, it's all good.

bjsmcp, proceed at your own risk! I, personally, would love to have access to the page-outs from York's new system. But I can tell you that you WILL NOT get the cap codes directly from the folks at York County.

__________________
Matt
"If the tallest building in your county is a grain silo, you DON'T need 800mhz!"

As for Lebanon's websites with their POCSAG message strings, well, I don't have the answer to that. Perhaps it's being done illegally, or maybe it's kosher because it's sponsored by the county. As Peter said, if the information is tapped from a hard-wired component of the system, and with the system owner's blessing, it's all good.

From Peter's earlier post in this thread:

One thing I would like to add, is MA/Com / Pagegate / Motorola / and several other Dispatch pager software & Hardware providers do sell a software and hardware option to display the outgoing pages on a HTML website. This way is Legal. I know MA/COM & PageGate has one for Lebanon County. It is like $210.00.

Hey OCGUARD, you have sparked my vast past knowledge. Could you please provide
chapter and verse where the FCC or another government agency has a federal law
that states you can not listen to a radio transmission. Having been in the radio field
for well over 45 years now and worked with the public safety agencies for most of
that time, I have never seen this.

With that said, I will say that it is illegal to divulge anything you hear or decode
from these radio transmissions if it wasn't intended for your use. The exception
is if it was a public broadcast or intended for the general public. An example of this
would be the interception of a cell call and recording the conversation. Then taking
that recording and giving it to a news station. You can end up in jail for this. It
actually happened a number of years ago. The other example is say a police officer makes
a radio broadcast that he sees a tornado coming into town. This is information
that effects the general public and should be openly spread by what ever means
is available.

Not trying to be a know it all or give you a hard time, just want to see the truth
passed along here and not twisted.

Jim

Quote:

Originally Posted by ocguard

Here I go again with your nonsense. You give me a headache. Your statement "If you can hear it you can decode" is absolutely ridiculous. Early cellular phone systems could be "decoded" my many scanners on the market, as could many portable phones. It is still illegal to intercept these transmissions. Even current cell phones aren't encrypted - they just operate in formats, such as TDMA, that aren't monitor-able my consumer scanners. This makes it no less legal to intercept these communications. These are telecommunications systems used by the public as an extension of the public telephone system. To intercept these calls is not only a violation of FEDERAL telecommunications laws but likely falls under federal, state, and local eavesdropping laws as well. You bring out the worst side of me on the board! Stick with GMRS.

As for Lebanon's websites with their POCSAG message strings, well, I don't have the answer to that. Perhaps it's being done illegally, or maybe it's kosher because it's sponsored by the county. As Peter said, if the information is tapped from a hard-wired component of the system, and with the system owner's blessing, it's all good.

bjsmcp, proceed at your own risk! I, personally, would love to have access to the page-outs from York's new system. But I can tell you that you WILL NOT get the cap codes directly from the folks at York County.

One thing I would like to add, is MA/Com / Pagegate / Motorola / and several other Dispatch pager software & Hardware providers do sell a software and hardware option to display the outgoing pages on a HTML website. This way is Legal. I know MA/COM & PageGate has one for Lebanon County. It is like $210.00.

Lebanon did not buy this add on device. Myself and another person helped the county setup there pager decoder with the same software we use.

my point is, the various counties can do a nice WEBCAD with the add on devices out there, so the public can see the dispatches going out.

JIM 202 there is the Federal Privacy Communications Act which says it is illegal to monitor cell, pager, and cordless phones, that is why scanner makers cannot include the Celluar phone frequencies in scanners today. I obviously cant quote this law to its exact content as I am not a geek and dont practice it, however it is there.

This doesnt mean you cant listen to Police, Fire, EMS or other frequencies it just states the above.

Now back onto the topic at hand the York County P25 System

Dont forget if you need to look anything up there is always the www.fcc.gov and they will have the info you need there.

While monitoring the DauCo. system, I see that York Co. Central System is online with a current CC of 500.5625. Getting a little over 74% decode on the CC here in Lebanon City.

Anyone hear any tg testing yet? or patches to the current Conventional systems?

I love seeing both York and DauCo. going full steam ahead on there 2 New Digital Radio systems, while we hear in Lebanon County sit and wait..... Our new radio system is already almost 4 years old. And so far, only LEA, EMA, Hazmat & COLT Busses are using the system....

Interesting how the York system is booming into Lebanon County; I wonder how deep into Lancaster County system it's being picked up. On the flip side, though, I wonder how long the strong signals into Lebanon will continue once the system is fully operational. Some systems tend to reduce power output once a system goes online after a booming signal during the testing phases.

Does anyone know if York is going to have a webcad html page? If not is there anyone who would like to help set one up? I can donate some resources if we can find some technical minds to help. I would also like to note that I have no interest in doing anything illegal. I am just trying to provide a nice public service to anyone that cares to listen. I agree with keeping the public informed. With the growing population and the lack of resources we have in York I believe public information is critical to the safety of all people in York.